Summary: Since A. Sen’s paper on poverty measurement [Econometrica 44, 219–231 (1976; Zbl 0349.90017)], a substantial literature, both theoretical and empirical, has emerged. There have been several recent efforts to drive poverty measures based on different approaches and axioms. These poverty indices are based on head count ratio, poverty gaps and distribution of income. These are very narrow in approach and suffer from several drawbacks. However, the purpose of the present paper is to introduce a new poverty measure based on a holistic and system modelling approach. Based on the second author’s human contestability [Poverty in an ethnic community: Asians in West Yorkshire. Leeds: Leeds University of Business School, University of Leeds (PhD thesis) (2003); Poverty as human contestability failure. Leeds: Wisdom House Publ. (2007)] approach to poverty, this new approach to measuring poverty has been developed using a structure equation model based on G. K. Kanji’s business excellence model [Measuring business excellence. Abingdon: Routledge (2002)] to create the proposed poverty model. We construct a latent variable structural equation model to measure the contestability excellence within certain boundaries of the societal system. It will provide us with a measurement of poverty in a society or community in terms of human contestability. A higher human contestability index will indicate the lower poverty within the society. Strengths and weakness as of various components will also indicate that a characteristic of the individual requires extra society or government support to remove poverty. However, there remains considerable disagreement on the best way to achieve this.